Saturday, December 31, 2011

This video is produced by Al Jazeera which has its own agenda on the Arab Risings.

Hama Hammami of PCOT in Tunisia provides us with an analysis of Al Jazeera the voice of the Qatari elite.

“Qatar is playing a dangerous role under the umbrella of USA; it is a government that serves America’s agenda, and also has direct relations with Israel. Qatar’s intentions are not patriotic,” Hammami said.

Hammami also asserted that Qatar is attempting to guide moderate Islamic parties, which are popular in Qatar, toward the political choices of the USA.

“Qatar is conditioning popular Islamic parties to serve American and Western interests, and they are managing to achieve that end through the messages that Ennahda is sending to America and Western society. Ennahda is basically assuring the west that the relationship between Tunisia and the West will not change. I do not have concrete proof but this is my political analysis.”.

The 3rd Avenue El in the Bronx was a major thoroughfare in the borough, and as such was a prime site for one trying to sell The Black Panther.

I had recently been assigned to the Bronx office and in an attempt to sell my 50 copies, I chose a stop on the line where the foot traffic would be quite heavy, as people descended from the elevated train ride. At roughly the same time, another young Black man elected to stop at the busy corner with the intention of selling his wares.

His wares were essentially the same as mine—newspapers. There, however, the similarity ended, for it was clear from his product that competition was inevitable.

The young man wore a dark-green iridescent suit and a brightly colored bow tie. His hair was cut close to his scalp in the “hustler” style, with a thin part cut in, his face shaved hairless. He carried with him a multi-colored plastic shopping bag that appeared to be filled with copies of Muhammad Speaks.

As I surveyed his wares, he was surveying mine. We looked at each other and understood that neither would relinquish the corner to the other.

And so, we began selling in earnest.

Shouts of “Help Us Free Huey!” mingled with “Salaam Aliekum, brother!” as we struggled to sell our product.

“Yo, brother! Find out what’s happenin’ that the white power structure ain’t gonna tell ya! Check out The Black Panther—only a quarter!”

For nearly an hour the sales continued, fed and famished by the flow of passerby debarking from the trains hissing to a stop overhead. After a while, we got into a conversation:

“Brother, you got to get with the Honorable Elijah Muhammad, and stop following those devils like Marx and Lenin and ’em.”

“Well, bro’—you should get with the Minister of Defense, Huey P. Newton, and the Black Panther Party.”

“You should follow a Black man, brother, not some Jews like Marx and Lenin!”

“We revolutionaries, brother, and we study about revolutionaries from around the world. We don’t care what race they is.”

“I can see that, brother,” glancing at a copy of The Black Panther, pointing to a cover picture of an Asian, full-haired man. “Who is that, brother?”

“That’s Kim Il-Sung, the leader of North Korea, and a revolutionary.”

“You see what I’m saying, brother? Here you go talking ‘bout another guy! He ain’t got nothin’ to say to Black people, brother!”

“Well, if that’s so, brother, why he in yo paper Muhammad Speaks?”

“What you talkin’ bout, brother?” he asked, seemingly stunned by the question.

I read and studied his paper quite regularly, for its layout, news, and commentary, but I doubted if he ever read any of ours. This seemed only logical for someone assigned to the East Coast Ministry of Information office, and I remembered reading this week’s issue of Muhammad Speaks.

“Check it out, brother, in yo international news section.”

In disbelief, he turned the pages until, sure enough, an article appeared bearing a photo of Kim Il-Sung. He looked at it, and then turned to me, smiling.

“Yes sir, brother. Yessir. Um-humm.”

“And what we learned from him was the idea of Juche, a Korean word that means self-reliance!”

Democracy and Class Struggle is publishing this report from the Himalayan for information purposes. We hope someone translates the full 12 page document into English so we can see in detail all the 40 plus charges brought against Prachanda by Comrade Kiran.

This document and the activities of Comrade Kiran are also a demonstration of the nature and character of the opposition to Prachanda and Bhattarai and may help us to better understand whether the Kiran/Badal opposition is genuine or if has some comrades have recently said that Comrade Kiran is merely the red fraction of the bourgeoisie within the UCPN Maoist.

Prachanda says the Maoist Party is dying and Kiran says it is being born anew in the struggle against revisionism, opportunism and liquidationism.

2012 will be a make or break year for the Maoist Movement in Nepal, we wish Nepalese Maoist comrades success in their difficult struggle.

In his 12-page political document presented at party’s ongoing Central Committee meeting at party headquarters in Paris Danda, Baidhya has claimed that there was no possibility of concluding the peace and constitution-drafting processes as per the aspirations of the people.

Referring to Prachanda aka Dahal, Baidhya said the leadership never made any attempt for the preparation of ‘people’s revolt’. “He is the centre of all negative attitudes, problems and interests that have cropped up in the party,” said Baidhya, accusing Dahal of trying to divert major issues by writing baseless issues in his document.

On Dahal’s comment that the party was gradually dying, the senior vice-chairman, who is also one of Dahal’s teacher, has claimed that a new party was in the making within the Unified CPN-Maoist in the wake of serious deviation from the original party line.

Baidhya added that it would be difficult to establish harmony in the party if the leadership failed to take the path of transformation.

Baidhya said the political document of Dahal was inspired by ‘rightist opportunism’ which can never resolve the crises in the party.

“Dahal, despite the party’s decision to withdraw, has given up all the party stances regarding drafting of ‘a pro-people constitution’ and supported the cause of the capitalist agents. Therefore the significance of the Constituent Assembly is on the wane,” he said.

“Party leadership was reluctant to withdraw the cases of people’s war, tried to throw out peasants from the land they had occupied without any proper alternative and deprived workers of their rights,” accused Baidhya. “In such a condition, it’s not good to remain in the government.”

He claimed that all the party decisions made by the first meeting of CC after Palungtar plenum have been reversed. “The four-point deal, agreement to hand over keys of containers and seven-point agreement are some of the examples,” he said. Baidhya tried to convince that there was still the possibility of ‘people’s revolt’. “The revolution for new people’s democracy is still essential and possible, and if the party can make effective arrangement for preparations, there are strong bases for people’s revolt. People will be forced to take to the streets if the parties fail to draft a pro-people constitution.”

Baidhya also urged the leadership to properly manage financial discipline in the party and make all the transactions transparent.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

I think that the Revolutionary Internationalist movement contributed to the setback of the Shining Path Movement and Nepal by launching attacks on Stalin and some of the fundamental Marxist Leninist Tenets.It was premature to form such an organisation with inadaequate development of proletarian parties worldwide and the Communist Movement.Some of the most significant writings opposing the R.I.M.were of the late Comrade Harbhajan Sohi in his writings on 'Invincibility of Mao Tse Tung Thought.'

Remember the Chinese Communist Party never advocated the formation of an International learning the lessons of the experience under Stalin.Since the fall of proletarian power in the C.C.P. there is no Socialist base in the World. History remembers that despite the achievement of C.P.C under Mao ,the party did not go towards establishing he Communist International or establishing an International Organisation. Instead it stressed for he Communist Parties of the camp to apply he universal truths of Marxism-Leninism in the concrete situation of their country. It emphasized that other countries should not copy the Chinese Experience to-to but apply the Chinese experience in accordance to their own condition.

The main reason for the C.P.C’s caution was Imperialism was devising through its local regimes new forms of neo-colonial rule and only a native communist party could analsye and review such situations. An outside force could not grasp the concrete reality. Thus the necessity of political independence of each country’s communist party.

Chauvinistic tendencies may also develop under Communist Parties .The more developed and advanced may act chauvinistically and deliver big-brother treatment to the less developed or successful parties.

The victory of a revolution in a country under the leadership of a Communist Party indicates that certain crucial contemporary problems of he revolutionary movement have been resolved by it ,and thus the experience can be passed on to Communist Parties of othe Countries.At present there is no such party in the World.The ideological political struggle against Oppurtunism within the revolutionary Camp is firce and bitter in each country.

A dialectical process involving unity of Communist Parties is required. Mutual exchange has to take place Actual experience should be shared, which would pave the way for more advanced forms of collective positions on issues and ralying of more forces worldwide. Mutual Exchange and Common stands, bilaterally and laterally,and multilateral platforms on the basis of the general line are required

Today in India and in other Countries the reorganization of he Communist Party is still in the process of being realized It is crucial to struggle to implement the correct line and establish its content with opportunism. In this process Communist revolutionaries have to strive to achieve unity on the basis of settling various line questions in connection with the revolutionary practice of the masers of the Indian people.

A 2 line struggle should be struggled against the trend of the formation of R.I.M itself to advance the International Communist Movement.Remember even the C.P.I.(Maoist) or erstwhile P.W group were never part of the R.I.M,nor The Communist party of Phillipines,who are still positively struggling as a revolutionary force.

The impetuous rise of class struggle in the world has exposed the subjected
capitulation of prachandist revisionism in Nepal and the disappearance of
the leading role of the Revolutionary Internationalist Movement - RIM.

It has appeared that the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) - CPN (M), being
a RIM member, has raised in the name of Maoism against Marxism Leninism
Maoism, clutching a revisionist platform of renunciation of destroying the
old reactionary state, of betraying the People's War by renouncing to it, by
disarming the people, by dismantling the bases of popular power already
conquered and by dissolving its People's Liberation Army in the reactionary
army of exploiters, and finally by merging with the revisionist party Mashal
in the Unified Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) - UCPN (M), and by
compromising with all others opportunist parties to defend the class
dictatorship of the landlords, the bourgeoisie and imperialism, and to serve
to run over the people.

It is likewise evident that the Committee of the RIM has, remaining silent
facing the revisionist line and the betrayal carried out by the CPN (M),
resigned in practice the role of being the international leading center, and
compromising the prestige of the RIM. It has cost a high price to the world
revolution and the international unity of the communists, allowing the
coexistence of opportunistic trends within the RIM, by the incorrect method
of restrict the lines struggle, and hiding the discussions to the
International Communist Movement - ICM and to the world proletariat.

Hence, facing the new problems caused by the deep world contradictions of
imperialism in the last decades, both the CPN (M) and the Revolutionary
Communist Party of the United States, seeing only the living appearance of
imperialism without going to the very agonizing core of capitalism, have
reached to the same revisionist conclusion: to declare null and void the
principles of revolutionary Marxism, and insufficient the universal theory
of Marxism Leninism Maoism to solve the problems of the revolution in this
century and, therefore, declared it overstepped in its "novel" revisionist
theories, made today under the ostentatious name of "Avakian's new
synthesis". Contrary to its hopelessness pessimism in the proletariat and in
the revolution, the new problems of our times have unleashed the world
forces of work against the imperialist parasitism, showing the orphanhood of
a world communist leadership, and with it the urgency for the international
unity of the marxist leninist maoists.

Against such a need that requires to differentiate and to break completely
with opportunism, rises again the familiar centrist tendency known in the
history of communist movement for its "conciliator" role between Marxism and
revisionism. A centrist tendency, headed today by the Communist Party
(Maoist) of Italy, direct continuation of the centrism in the RIM yesterday,
and mainly in its Committee.

In the open bourgeois degeneration of prachandism, the centrists, who
yesterday praised his theory, ignored the treason in Nepal and supported
bourgeois parliamentarism of the PCNU (M), declare today themselves to be
against Prachanda, but actually without breaking with prachandism.

They remain supporters of a fraction of prachandism that no longer
recognizes Prachanda as leader, but Kiran. They repudiate the current
symbolic acts of Bhattarai and Prachanda in the surrender of the revolution,
but deny the revisionist nature of the party and escape its responsibility
in the real political betrayal of People's War conducted in the Peace
Agreement of 2006.

Centrism both reconciles and calls "red" a fraction of the revisionist right
in Nepal, and fights angry against the revolutionary communists whom are
called "dogmatic-revisionists" and "opportunistic liquidators" for their
struggle against revisionism and centrism.

It fears the complete rupture, ideological, political and organizational,
with the revisionist line of the UCPN (M), a condition without which it is
not possible to conceive a true revolutionary line in Nepal, able to return
to the People's War and lead it, to conquer the triumph of the Revolution of
New Democracy in the whole country.

Before the visible collapse of the RIM, centrism that yesterday gave
legitimacy to the silent complicity, now denies that the RIM was defeated by
the revisionist line which it was unable to fight in their midst, and
attempts to revive it with the support of UCPN (M), but without the hegemony
of the RCP, USA.

Thus, centrism hides the main danger that represents revisionism for the
unity of the ICM, minimizing its treason to the world proletariat and its
outrages against the people of Nepal, opaque the vision of the communists
and prevents the workers of the world to clearly understand the role of
revisionism in the defeat of their political movement, contributing to keep
them away from the political problems of their revolution.

It is our unwavering commitment to fight for the international unity of the
Marxist Leninist Maoists, which requires the demolition of the false
revisionist theories and the eclectic positions of centrism, drawing a deep
demarcation between Marxism and opportunism in the whole general line of the
International Communist Movement, as firm foundation of unity to build the
new International that has to lead the grandiose battles of the world
proletarian revolution against imperialism and all its lackeys.

AGAINST REVISIONISM AND CENTRISM: LONG LIVE MARXISM LENINISM MAOISM!

FOR A NEW COMMUNIST INTERNATIONAL BASED ON MARXISM LENINISM MAOISM:

FORWARD!

December 26th - 2011

Arab Maoists

Colectivo Odio de Clase - Estado Español

Parti Communiste Marxiste-Léniniste-Maoïste - France

Partido Comunista del Ecuador Sol Rojo

Partido Comunista del Perú - Base Mantaro Rojo

Partido Comunista Popular Maoísta - Argentina

Partido Comunista (Marxista-Leninista) de Panamá

Proletarian Party of East Bengal (PBSP) (Maoist Unity Group)/Bangladesh

Without the Communist Party, there would be no new China.
Without the Communist Party, there would be no new China.
The Communist Party works hard for the people.
The Communist Party - it strives to save China.
It pointed the people the road to liberation.
It leads China toward brightness.
It adhered to the War of Resistance for over eight years.
It improved the people's living.
It established guerrilla bases.
It practiced democracy, bringing many advantages.
Without the Communist Party, there would be no new China.
Without the Communist Party, there would be no new China.

Sunday, December 25, 2011

The truce began on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1914, when German troops began decorating the area around their trenches in the region of Ypres, Belgium, for Christmas. They began by placing candles on trees, then continued the celebration by singing Christmas carols, most notably Stille Nacht (Silent Night). The British troops in the trenches across from them responded by singing English carols.

The two sides continued by shouting Christmas greetings to each other. Soon thereafter, there were calls for visits across the "No Man's Land" where small gifts were exchanged — whisky, jam, cigars, chocolate, and the like. The artillery in the region fell silent that night. The truce also allowed a breathing spell where recently-fallen soldiers could be brought back behind their lines by burial parties. Proper burials took place as soldiers from both sides mourned the dead together and paid their respects. At one funeral in No Man's Land, soldiers from both sides gathered and read a passage from the 23rd Psalm: The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures. He leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the path of righteousness for his name's sake. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

The truce spread to other areas of the lines, and there are many stories of football matches between the opposing forces. The film Joyeux Noël suggests that letters sent home from both British and German soldiers related that the score was 3-2 in favour of the Germans.

Lenin, the leader of the working class revolution in Russia, heard about the Christmas truce. He pointed out that if there were organizations prepared to fight for such a policy among the soldiers of all the belligerent nations, there might have been a quick end to the world war in favor of the working masses. Lenin wrote, “Try to imagine Hyndman, Guesde, Vandervelde, Plekhanov, Kautsky and the rest [leaders of so-called socialist parties that supported the world war] – instead of aiding the bourgeoisie (something they are now engaged in – forming an international committee to agitate for fraternization and attempts to establish friendly relations between the socialists of the belligerent countries, both in the trenches and among the troops in general. What would the results be several months from now?”

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Hama Hamami, leader of Communist Workers Party of Tunisia (POCT), claimed yesterday that ”The Qatari regime is an enemy to Tunisia and the Arab World,” referring to Qatar’s alleged involvement in the guiding of democratic uprisings of 2011 in North Africa and the Middle East.Qatar’s role in the “Arab Spring” has been a source of controversy among politicians and citizens across the Arabic-speaking world.Many have claimed that the tiny Gulf emirate has been promoting its agenda through its television channel Al Jazeera, while others have claimed that Qatar has broader motives for backing and supporting Islamist parties.The Tunisian Islamist Party Ennahda, whose historic election victory solidified its hold on the largest share of seats in the Constituent Assembly, was accused of having affiliations with, and accepting financial aid from, Qatar.The extent of political and economic Qatari involvement in Tunisia’s affairs has been a large point of contention in Tunisia since the revolution. Hamma Hamami, leader of POCT, stated that Qatar is playing a dangerous game, and is only serving its own agenda. He also added that Qatar is an agent of USA and Israel.“Qatar is playing a dangerous role under the umbrella of USA; it is a government that serves America’s agenda, and also has direct relations with Israel. Qatar’s intentions are not patriotic,” Hamami said.Hamami also asserted that Qatar is attempting to guide moderate Islamic parties, which are popular in Qatar, toward the political choices of the USA.“Qatar is conditioning popular Islamic parties to serve American and Western interests, and they are managing to achieve that end through the messages that Ennahda is sending to America and Western society. Ennahda is basically assuring the west that the relationship between Tunisia and the West will not change. I do not have concrete proof but this is my political analysis.”Hamami also referred specifically to Al Jazeera, claiming that during the electoral campaign the network was 90% pro-Ennahda.When asked about Qatar’s support for Tunisia economically, he said that Tunisia does not need financial aid as much as it needs a, “political economy.”“Tunisia is a self-sufficient country that is rich with natural resources – it is not about having money. A good example is Libya: The country was rich but they were living in awful conditions,” he added.“The revolutions were authentic, but the USA wants to orient these new democratic movements in their own direction,” he added.Samir Dilou, an Ennahda member who is rumored to hold the post of the Human Rights and Transitional Justice Minister (and to be spokesperson of the upcoming Government) disagreed with Hamami.“I respect what he said, but I do not agree with him. It is his political opinion and it lacks any concrete proof.”He added that Tunisia’s relations with Qatar are no different from Tunisia’s relations with other Arab countries.“Our relations with Qatar are nothing but friendly, just like any other Arab country. We want what’s in our nation’s best interest, and if that involves having economic relations with Qatar, or any other Arab country, then we will not be against it. We welcome all Arab investors.”When asked about Al Jazeera being Pro-Ennahda, he replied,”We actually protested against Al Jazeera before because some of its broadcasts were anti-Ennahda. We respect media but Al Jazeera is sometimes right and sometimes wrong.”http://www.tunisia-live.net/2011/12/20/tunisian-communist-leader-accuses-qatari-regime-of-being-an-enemy-to-tunisia-and-arab-world/

Picture Comrade Kiran

December 16th

Q. Your experience with the formulation of national constitution in the last two years and the resistance by the reactionary parliamentary right wingers like Nepali congress. How do you sum it up in retrospect?

A. Our experience of Constituent Assembly for the last two years and our co-work with parliamentarian parties, including Nepali Congress, has been very complicated and bitter. In this whole process, intense ideological struggle is going on between two mutually contradictory trends: whether to build a new national army by integrating PLA in a dignified manner or make them surrender by disarming them and whether to attempt writing people’s constitution with anti-feudal and anti-imperialist content or write a parliamentarian constitution based on status quo. In this struggle our party is becoming weaker day by day.

In this course, a serious two-line struggle is taking place on the evaluation of different compromises and agreements reached from the past to now.

Q. Indian Maoists, your counterpart from India, were skeptical over your participation in the parliamentary path without the overthrow of the then existent state structures. Your party chose to restructure the state apparatus by participating in the bourgeoisie state legislature. How do you see it in retrospect?

A. Our party had initiated and conducted the great people’s war to establish new democratic state power by destroying the old one. However, without accomplishing this task we took a course of compromise and adopted a policy of restructuring the state. We take it as our limitation and obligation. It is natural for the Indian Maoists to be skeptical of our party. Our party’s practice in the days to come will provide correct answer to the doubt that the Indian comrades have expressed or will justify its irrelevance or relevance.

Q. Your nation is sandwiched between two giant powers of the south Asia, i.e. India and china. Your party saw India as more harmful than China against your revolutionary tide. Later, Prachanda, your party chairman was becoming more friendly to India shirking anti Indian stance. How do you explain this duality?

A. Yes, our country is sandwiched between two giant powerful countries of the south Asia, like India and china. We want to maintain a good neighbourly relation and go ahead by honouring each other’s national integrity and reverence with both of these countries. There are various unequal treaties, including the treaty of 1950, between Nepal and India. But, there are no such unequal treaties with China. In this sense, we oppose the expansionist attitude of the Indian ruling classes. However, we are not opposed to Indian people. We want to abrogate unequal treaties and sign up the new ones that are based on common interest and mutual equality of both the countries.

I don’t think it will be appropriate to look at chairman comrade Prachanda’s view and practice upon India as dualist. Because, it may be perhaps a question in which he showed his limitation or shortcoming in properly paying attention to the dialectical relation between diplomacy and politics.

Q. Does your party still view India as expansionist state in south Asia endangering the national aspirations of the regional entities?

A. Yes, we still think so. This position of ours is pointed only towards the Indian ruling classes, which are in minority. We look at the entire Indian people from the viewpoint of equality and think that they are our friends for Nepalese revolution.

Q. At the time of participation in election process, the armed overthrow was given a goby suggesting peaceful transition to power. You were putting forward the fusion theory to mobilize the urban upsurge.

A. Yes, we chose this way or that way a path of peaceful electoral process by diverting our attention from the path of destroying the old state power in an armed manner. Here, we have a number of shortcomings, limitations and obligations, we summing up all this mercilessly want to go ahead.

So far as the concept of fusion adopted to organise urban insurrection is concerned, it is correct and needs further explanation. In view of the development of information technology and imperialist globalisation we are trying to develop a concept of fusion in which some of the tactics of armed insurrection are incorporated into the protracted people’s war, which is principal. It is necessary to pay attention to both of its aspects: further study and practical implementation. A danger of the party being dipped in the swamp of right revisionism is growing and we are careful on it. Thanks.

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

The following video below is a short version of the Chinese Film on Wukan above with English Translation and subtitles.

Picture Yang Semao

Guangdong's deputy Communist Party secretary Zhu Mingguo told Wukan village protest leader Yang Semao on Wednesday that four villagers being held by police would be released over the next few days, Yang told The Associated Press.

"So now we are cautiously optimistic," Yang said.

Picture of Wukan martyr Xue Jinbo The Government agreed to release “in due course” the body of Xue Jinbo, the protest leader allegedly beaten to death in police custody nearly two weeks ago, Mr Lin said.

Mr Lin did not say when the body of he 42-year old father of three would be released — police claim he died of a “sudden illness” but his family allege he was beaten to death

Timeline of Struggle in Wukan 1993: Wukan Hong Kong Industrial Development Co., Ltd. is established; The Wukan government begins selling village land. April 3rd, 2009: A leaflet appears in Wukan village entitled, “A letter to fellow townsfolk of Wukan — We’re not ‘Dead Village Slaves.’” More village land is sold, the village government alters the elections as the majority of the villagers discuss the issue of the leaflet. April 3rd, 2009: More than 20 young people from Wukan travel to petition Guangdong provincial government leaders, soon arriving in Guangzhou’s Zhongshan Park to plan the formation of the “Wukan Hotblooded Youth Group.” The group members go on to petition eleven provincial, city, county-level city, and small-town governments. March 14th, 2011: Five Wukan village representatives take their sixth petition to the Guangdong Provincial Complaints Bureau, then decides to send a specific delegate to seek audience for the purpose of developing collective representation. September 21st, 2011: Three thousand villagers gather in Wukan (a coastal town on the East China Sea in Lufeng County, Shanwei Prefecture, Guangdong Province) to discuss a series of problematic incidents in the area. They collectively petition the Lufeng County Government, inquiring about arrangements regarding Jade Laurel Garden (Bi Gui Yuan). As they return home, a group of villagers numbering around a dozen smash a group of Jade Laurel Garden workers’ dormitories and some materials belonging to the Tranquil Industrial Park (Tai Gongye Yuan). That evening three youths from Wukan are arrested by the local police. September 22nd, 2011: Wukan villagers convene a village committee to confront the problems, but the local police arrive and intervene. Soon afterwards, three to four hundred municipal police enter Wukan. A clash between the police and the people breaks out around Jin Gang street and Xinhua Fourth Road, causing over 10 people to be heavily injured and resulting in 12 police and government vehicles damaged or even flipped. September 23rd, 2011: Thirteen self-appointed village delegates have discussions with city government officials. The government promises to abolish the villagers’ debt, return land, and to elect three special groups to enter the village and conduct an investigation. September 28th, 2011: The Wukan village committee organizes elected representatives to go to the National People’s Congress, the villagers call into question the [earlier] illegal elections. November 11th, 2011: Four thousand villagers provide signatures and march to the Lufeng Municipal Government with their petition. Lufeng Mayor Qiu Jinxiong personally appears to address the demands and urges the protestors to return home.

April 3rd, 2009: A leaflet appears in Wukan village entitled, “A letter to fellow townsfolk of Wukan — We’re not ‘Dead Village Slaves.’” More village land is sold, the village government alters the elections as the majority of the villagers discuss the issue of the leaflet.

April 3rd, 2009: More than 20 young people from Wukan travel to petition Guangdong provincial government leaders, soon arriving in Guangzhou’s Zhongshan Park to plan the formation of the “Wukan Hotblooded Youth Group.” The group members go on to petition eleven provincial, city, county-level city, and small-town governments.

March 14th, 2011: Five Wukan village representatives take their sixth petition to the Guangdong Provincial Complaints Bureau, then decides to send a specific delegate to seek audience for the purpose of developing collective representation.

September 21st, 2011: Three thousand villagers gather in Wukan (a coastal town on the East China Sea in Lufeng County, Shanwei Prefecture, Guangdong Province) to discuss a series of problematic incidents in the area. They collectively petition the Lufeng County Government, inquiring about arrangements regarding Jade Laurel Garden (Bi Gui Yuan). As they return home, a group of villagers numbering around a dozen smash a group of Jade Laurel Garden workers’ dormitories and some materials belonging to the Tranquil Industrial Park (Tai Gongye Yuan). That evening three youths from Wukan are arrested by the local police.

September 22nd, 2011: Wukan villagers convene a village committee to confront the problems, but the local police arrive and intervene. Soon afterwards, three to four hundred municipal police enter Wukan. A clash between the police and the people breaks out around Jin Gang street and Xinhua Fourth Road, causing over 10 people to be heavily injured and resulting in 12 police and government vehicles damaged or even flipped.

September 23rd, 2011: Thirteen self-appointed village delegates have discussions with city government officials. The government promises to abolish the villagers’ debt, return land, and to elect three special groups to enter the village and conduct an investigation.

September 28th, 2011: The Wukan village committee organizes elected representatives to go to the National People’s Congress, the villagers call into question the [earlier] illegal elections.

November 11th, 2011: Four thousand villagers provide signatures and march to the Lufeng Municipal Government with their petition. Lufeng Mayor Qiu Jinxiong personally appears to address the demands and urges the protestors to return home.

Xue Jinbo - Martyr of Wukan

The residents’ democratically elected village leaders said they had managed to extract initial concessions from senior provincial leaders to their immediate demand for the government to release three villagers detained in recent weeks.

They also received a promise of a full investigation into the death in police custody of village leader Xue Jinbo on December 11, the return of his body and a guarantee that elected village leaders would not be considered criminals.

“They gave a positive response to our suggestions and agreed to release our three young people within two days,” said Lin Zuluan, a village representative.

Picture Yang Semao

Guangdong's deputy Communist Party secretary Zhu Mingguo told Wukan village protest leader Yang Semao on Wednesday that four villagers being held by police would be released over the next few days, Yang told The Associated Press.